The League of Women Voters of Tarrant County and the League of United Latin American Citizens are suing Tarrant County, the county's commissioners court and County Judge Tim O'Hare over its mid-decade districting.
The two groups claim in a lawsuit filed Thursday the "secretive, rushed process" violates the Texas Open Meetings Act, purposely discriminates against Black and Latino voters and O'Hare as well as most of the commissioners violated the state constitution.
"In Tarrant County, a county with more residents of color than white residents, the Tarrant County Commissioners adopted a precinct map that dilutes the power of those residents of color, over the objections of the community," said Janet Mattern, president of the League of Women Voters of Tarrant County. "This is illegal and is something the League will not stand for."
Republican commissioners led an unusual mid-decade redistricting process this past spring, redrawing the commissioners court precinct maps to add another Republican-majority precinct.
They openly said they wanted to give themselves a larger majority on the commissioners court.
KERA News reached out to the county and O’Hare and will update this story with any response.
Opponents to redistricting say Republicans created that extra conservative precinct by packing Democratic-leaning voters of color into a single district, diluting their voting power.
The suit says in 2021, the Commissioners Court conducted a redistricting review of its commissioners’ precincts by “explicitly adopted criteria.’ The criteria, among several rules, required any new map to “avoid racial gerrymandering” and “have compact and contiguous precincts,” according to the suit.
The precincts at the time were “evenly distributed” amid recent population growth, according to the suit, and says the Commissioners Court voted 4-1 to keep that electoral map in place until the 2030 Census.
It claims the commissioners, led by O’Hare, ignored the criteria with its proposed redistricting efforts in April.
“There was no new census data or apparent triggering event to justify this abrupt decision,” the suit read.
O’Hare hired the Public Interest Legal Foundation, a conservative law firm to redraw the lines of the four commissioners court precincts. Each Tarrant County commissioner represents one geographic precinct, except for the county judge, who represents the whole county.
The suit claims PILF’s aid helped quicken the process behind closed doors by not providing publicly adopted redistricting criteria or public drawing sessions. Five proposed maps were submitted to commissioners in May and then released to the public by Democratic Tarrant County Commissioner Alisa Simmons, who previously said are an attempt to draw her out of her seat. Two more proposed maps were submitted at the end of May.
Commissioners voted 3-2 along party lines to adopt Map 7 in June. It largely reshapes precincts 1 and 2, which are represented by Democrats.
Republican Commissioners Manny Ramirez, Matt Krause and County Judge Tim O'Hare voted to adopt the map. Democratic Commissioners Alisa Simmons and Roderick Miles Jr. voted against it.
The map reshapes the two Democrat-controlled precincts and makes Precinct 2 more friendly to Republicans, according to past election data shared by the county.
The groups are suing on counts of secret walking quorum meetings in violation of the Texas Open Meetings Act, redistricting in violation of the Texas Constitution, racial discrimination in violation of the Texas Civils Practice and Remedies Code, intentional racial discrimination in violation of the Texas Constitution and temporary disenfranchisement in violation of the Texas Constitution.
Additional reporting from Miranda Suarez.
Penelope Rivera is KERA's Breaking News Reporter. Got a tip? Email Penelope at privera@kera.org.
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